Kolkata, May 29 (IANS) West Bengal Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) legislator Mostafa Bin Quasem, suffering from a kidney ailment, Sunday committed suicide by jumping from the third floor of the legislators’ hostel here, police said.
A senior party leader, however, claimed that the nearly 70-year-old Basirhat North legislator jumped off the fourth floor.
A suicide note was recovered from his room and it said that he decided to end his life due to his unbearable pain, said a police officer.
‘Quasem might have jumped out of his room through the window when none of his family members were present. His son noticed the body on the parapet (on the first floor) and informed police,’ said CPI-M leader and former speaker Hasim Abdul Halim, flanked by party colleague Rabin Deb.
According to employees and witnesses at the legislators’ hostel, Quasem’s son Masum Bin Quasem returned to the hostel around 5 p.m. after seeing off his wife. He found that the door of his father’s room was not locked from inside.
He could not see his father and when he peeped out of the window he found his father’s body lying in a pool-of-blood on the first floor parapet, said a hostel employee.
Masum’s screams caught the attention of the neighbours who called police.
Police, fire and emergency services department personnel rushed Quasem to Calcutta Medical College, where he was declared brought dead.
In the recently concluded assembly elections, Quasem was elected from Basirhat North assembly constituency in North 24 Parganas district and used to live in the state legislators’ hostel. His wife was in his home in the district.
The legislator was elected from Baduria constituency in 1977 and from Swarupnagar constituency in 1991, 1996, 2001 and 2006. He was also elected as Rajya Sabha MP in 1983.
An investigation has been initiated and sleuths of city police’s homicide department and other officers of the detective department were busy finding evidence to find the cause of the death and if there was any foul play, said a senior police officer.
‘In the suicide note he wrote that both of his kidneys were defunct and he was suffering from long. He was also a patient of arthritis. Because of his unbearable pain he had decided to end his life,’ said another senior city police officer.
He was suffering from urinal infection for which he was admitted to hospital May 26. He was discharged Saturday evening.
West Bengal Chief Minister and Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee, after being informed about Quasem’s unnatural death, rushed to the spot and hospital.
‘It is an unfortunate incident. He was suffering from kidney ailment. If I had an opportunity to get introduced with him I would have arranged for his treatment,’ said Banerjee.
